Archive for ‘news’
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Guy! I am starting my new job and catching up on stuff around the house. For example, I spent five hours weeding this week (no kidding). Things are coming along great and I am ready to draw more for your entertainment. Well, I’m ready to draw more for my entertainment. I post it online in hopes that someone else is entertained, but I really do it for me. If you don’t find it funny, then you’re nothing like me. You can breathe a sigh of relief. Trust me, you don’t want that.
But short post long, I will be returning to the drawing board and the next post will be Wednesday July 14th, just two short weeks away. I am definitely in a lot better frame of mind now, and there is no significant chance that I will decide to end it at this point. That’s a good thing as I see it, because I think we can all agree on one thing: If there’s one thing the Internet is short on, it’s poorly-executed amateur comics by young, white males.
Let me cut to the chase: I have resigned my current job and accepting a new one. Everything is official, and the new job starts next week. This has been a long process of begging my employers for a promotion, working extra-hard on projects, applying for many jobs in the evenings, and trying to figure out how to do this and keep a precarious household budget in check. You know, the stuff that every household goes through at some point in time. The last month has been particularly trying, but now I am getting to the point where I can make the transition to new employment and try to reclaim my life and my comic.
What does this mean for the comic? Well, not much. While I start my new job next week, it will still be a transitional period for me. I’ll be learning all sorts of new software, new protocols, new everythings. I am guessing that the comic won’t resume until mid-July as estimated earlier. Nothing will change in content, at least nothing related to a job switch. These characters were never autobiographical, and my life change isn’t theirs. I have simply been working hard at getting my professional life straightened out so I can enjoy my personal life more.
Of course, that will probably come across in the comic, but it will not be a driving factor of story lines. So, the comic will definitely see a positive impact from these changes. Also, being occupied by working matters has taught me how to scribble down quick doodles where and when I can. This is a good habit, one that keeps me drawing. In fact, I’m probably drawing as much if not more than when I do the comic! If I could put that time to good use, I would, but unfortunately it’s a minute here, a minute there, whenever I have it with whatever I have. I can’t do any quality, finished work that way. That being said, all that scribbling will show through in higher-quality comics over time. Despite the fact that there will be no immediate payoff for taking this new job in comic terms, it will prove to have been a positive move over time.
Thanks for staying tuned. You guys are awesome.
–Lou
* You may have noticed this is a “State of the Artist” post, not a “State of the Comic” post. This post was all about me, baby, and I wanted to punctuate that. Unfortunately, there’s no punctuation mark that says, “What has two fingers and is making huge life changes? This cartoonist here, baby!” That is why I settled with the title I did. Trust me, if that punctuation mark comes in to being, I’ll find use for it.
Some of you may be wondering why you haven’t seen an update recently, and why updates have been irregular lately. Others probably haven’t noticed at all, as it seems many people catch up a month at a time. That’s cool, I do that sometimes. Just so everyone knows, I’m shelving the comic for an indefinite period of time. I’m thinking mid-July at the latest, but I can’t say for sure.
I am not creating the comic I want to create. I am not giving you my best work. I never set out for this to be my magnum opus of course, but I still expect it to reflect my work towards improvement. I have been taking shortcuts and putting out comics simply to have an update, and that is wrong. It doesn’t help me get better, and it doesn’t give you the entertainment you’ve come to expect. Worse, for you new readers you expect less out of me, which doesn’t keep me on my creative toes.
I simply have hit a creative wall. There is so much going on right now that I need time to regroup and recalibrate. It’s not a time issue, in fact I spent a good 15 hours this week playing Red Dead Redemption. That’s enough for three comics, at least. I have been putting out garbage, detritus which shames me, and I can’t in good conscience keep doing so.
There’s a small chance I may end the comic. Unlikely, but possible. If so, I’ll undoubtedly replace it with some other creative endeavor. Also, I will have a proper ending. I don’t know how long it will run, but I know how I want it to end and I will give you that satisfaction. You should be comforted by that. At least, that was my intent.
I hope you, my loyal readers, understand. If not, well, I didn’t give you much to go on besides “I don’t want to, wah wah wah”. I can’t say I blame you for not understanding. But if you don’t understand, I do request your patience. As always, I am available by e-mail and I highly encourage you to follow me on Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/LouManglass). Any comic news appears there first, so it’s worth checking out.
I will most likely be making changes in the next few months as well, as I decide what kind of future I want for my comic. I have a small (but awesome!) readership, so commercializing it is right out at this point. That doesn’t mean I couldn’t start advertising and such. A change I am most likely going to make is closing down my Facebook site. I have someone in mind to start a fan page which everyone can follow, and I will post instructions as to how to get my comic’s RSS feed integrated in to your Facebook, er, whatever it’s called. I may even create a Facebook app, if that’s your thing. I don’t know yet, but know that if I do close the Facebook account I will not leave you Facebookers hanging. If anything, I’ll give you more options.
That’s all for now. If you have any questions, I always accept comments. Please e-mail, call, tweet, what-have-you and I shall respond.
Thanks for all the laughs, guys! I remain yours,
Lou
I am changing the schedule effective immediately. New comics will post on Monday and Thursday nights. I should have one up tomorrow, Tuesday at the latest. I was out of town all last week and part of the weekend for work, so that is why it may be Tuesday before the new comic goes up this week.
The schedule change will be in effect indefinitely. I would like to go back to Sunday/Wednesday, but for the next few weeks to months a Monday/Thursday schedule is more convenient. I also plan on going back and coloring in the two comics from last week.
Thanks for your understanding. I have a lot on my plate in the coming months, and I am doing my best to keep up the twice a week schedule.
It occurred to me that not everyone is on Twitter. For shame. FOR SHAME!
Anyway, since some of y’all are not on Twitter, you missed my post that YAWC will continue Wednesday (yes, THIS Wednesday)! I have all of my ar supplies, or at least the important ones, and am ready to continue. Thanks to everyone for their patience, and thanks also to those who found my comic during the hiatus and followed/friended/etc.‘d me. Let’s have us some comic-reading fun!
Also, a quick poll: What site features would you like to see, and in what order: (1) Fix the gallery (2) Activate comments (3) Fix story lines for back comics (4) Other. If you choose Other, don’t be a wise guy or girl: let me know what feature you want. Details count. Send an e-mail if you have to.
I added a new section: fan art (http://www.yawcomic.com/fan-art/). It’s kind of raw, but as you know I’m in the process of building a better site. That being the case, I didn’t want to do a lot of work twice. I think I’ll put it in a gallery, and while I’m doing that roll out the half-finished gallery code I use for my work. I always meant to finish that, and I had such great ideas, but I am too lazy to reinvent the wheel apparently.
Let me get back to the point I was originally trying to make. I have a new section, and it has an excellent entry by Rob Lundy of http://www.consolehopping.com/ Check it out, then check out his comic.
A mere year after I put up the Comicpress-powered site, I have finally moved all of my comics over. The entire catalog of 324ish comics (and growing!) is now live on the site! You may notice I have removed the archive link: It no longer serves any purpose. Now all of my comics are on the current site and are fully indexed.
I spent the day writing code to grab all of the useful information from the old site (237 pages worth), parse that in to database gobbledygook, and automagically rename all the old image files properly. It was a length process that took me a few hours, but it saved me days of manually porting this information over.
A fair amount of testing went in to this effort, but I may have missed things. I want to encourage you to dive in to the archives, check out old favorite comics, and let me know if you notice anything weird. Also, tell all your friends that my site is finally complete, and let’s see if we can’t get more eyeballs on the archive to make sure it is correct.
The only thing that should really be of note is that the comics before 237 are not organized in to story lines. This is because my old site was poorly organized and often not broken out in to story lines, so I’ll have to go do that by hand.
I won’t be extending deadlines this time, so I wanted to remind everyone that Christmas card orders close on 4 December. That’s next Friday! At $1 a card and $5 shipping, it’s a really good deal, and I even have prices on a complete card service, from print through mailing to your prepared list. You never have to touch them! It’d be a shame, as they’re fantastic cards, but who am I to judge? Head on over to the Merch page to check them out.
Since it seems a whole bunch of other comics just opened orders for Christmas cards this week, I am going to run a second printing of my older cards, available for purchase. Please place all orders by 4 December, and I will ship on 7 December. The following page contains more details:
Crackers, it’s Nov 6th already! I wanted today to be the cutoff for ordering Christmas cards, but I didn’t plan ahead. A lack of planning on my part should not become a problem to you, so I will accept orders for Christmas cards through midnight Sunday EST. This will allow me to print them and get them shipped next week, in plenty of time to send them out for the holidays. Remember, this is it: If you were waiting around for any reason, now is your last chance to get a set of cards for this holiday season: http://www.yawcomic.com/merch/